Many athletes give gluten a 'goodbye'

Elite runner Anna Miller finds that wheat weighs her down when preparing for a marathon. Miller stretching and running, in Washington, DC on October 06, 2013. [CREDIT: Juana Arias, for the Washington Post]

By ANNA MEDARIS MILLER
The Washington Post

Whoever said that running a marathon is mostly mental lied. That’s what I was thinking as I winced across the 14th Street Bridge in Washington during the 2010 Marine Corps Marathon.

After 20-plus miles, it wasn’t a lack of energy or a bad attitude that was holding me back but troubles with, to put it politely, my gastrointestinal tract.

Though I finished the marathon, it took me nearly two more years and two uncomfortable half-marathons to come to terms with the likely source of my problem: gluten.

I don’t have celiac disease, an autoimmune reaction to gluten (a protein found in bread, pasta and many other foods containing wheat, barley or rye), but my internist says I am probably gluten-sensitive, a less serious condition that can come with such symptoms as diarrhea, bloating and joint pain.

While there is no diagnostic test for gluten sensitivity, the Center for Celiac Research at Massachusetts General Hospital for Children estimates that about 6 percent of Americans fit the condition’s murky criteria: They don’t have celiac, but their symptoms are alleviated when they stop eating gluten.

Gluten-free diets are gaining popularity, with U.S. sales of these foods “reaching $4.2 billion in 2012, for a compound annual growth rate of 28 percent over the 2008-2012 period,” according to a report by the market research company Packaged Facts.

It’s a striking shift, particularly among endurance athletes, who come from a carb-loading culture where pre-race pasta and post-race beer are as essential as the bib number on your back and the sneakers on your feet.

All that is changing now: The idea that an endurance athlete’s diet needs to include plenty of carbohydrates — whether gluten-filled spaghetti or gluten-free potatoes — is no longer gospel.

“What we used to say to endurance athletes is that 60 to 70 percent of their daily intake should be from carbs,” says Leslie Bonci, director of sports nutrition at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. “Now, that’s unnecessary. If you’re getting 50 percent, that’s enough.”

Celebrity athletes are helping fuel the gluten-free lifestyle: Saints quarterback Drew Brees, the Garmin cycling team and top tennis player Novak Djokovic have all been vocal about its benefits.

“It wasn’t a new racquet, a new workout, a new coach, or even a new serve that helped me lose weight, find mental focus, and enjoy the best health of my life. It was a new diet,” says Djokovic in his new book, “Serve to Win: The 14-Day Gluten-Free Plan for Physical and Mental Excellence.”

After gaining a reputation of being unpredictable, prone to sickness and even out of shape — something that commentators often blamed on asthma — Djokovic went gluten-free in 2010. The next year, he won 10 tennis titles, three Grand Slam events and 43 consecutive matches. He’s now ranked No. 1 in the world by the Association of Tennis Professionals.

There’s debate in the medical and sports communities about why eliminating gluten may have a positive effect on athletic performance.

Eating a lot of gluten is akin to “asking your GI system to do an impossible mission: to digest something that’s not digestible,” says Alessio Fasano, a pediatric gastroenterologist at Massachusetts General Hospital for Children. “If everything is working as it should, then your immune system can 'clean up’ those undigested fragments of gluten, and everything is fine.”

But eliminating gluten frees the body from this dead-end mission, allowing it to focus on carrying oxygen to the muscles. This, some theorize, is why eliminating gluten may boost athletic performance.

Still, a gluten-free diet won’t turn you into an Olympic athlete, Fasano says. “But when you go to the high-level performing athletes in which a fraction of a second can mean the difference between winning and losing an event, or being able to complete a marathon or not within a certain time frame, that can be the small edge that helps you.”

There are other theories as to why some athletes report improved athletic performance after eliminating gluten.

Bonci, a nutrition consultant to the Washington Nationals, Pittsburgh Steelers and other sports teams, says that some people blame their GI and other problems on gluten when the real issue may be portion size. When people stop eating “bagels that look like flying saucers” and instead choose, say, a dainty rice cake, they’re likely to feel better, regardless of their sensitivity to gluten.

“It’s a quantity change,” too, she says.

Last modified: October 25, 2013
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